The Sunny Club
by OptimisticLady
Summary: Jasmine Wilson comes to Sherlock and John with a curious case about the very brief time she spent as a member of The Sunny Club. Modern AU of The Red-Headed League.


It was early evening during spring time that Sherlock Holmes was found pacing the living room of 221B Baker Street, much to the irritation of John Watson. Things were running a little dry at Scotland Yard – meaning no cold cases for Sherlock to solve – and crime rates in London were at their lowest – meaning nothing new for him to solve. John was definitely surprised he hadn't cracked yet and begged for the cigarettes.

"Sherlock, I know you want yet _another_ case but you need to calm down," John tried to reason with him, but it seemed like it was in vain.

"I _need_ a case!"

"We just got back from solving a case by scaling the Shard!" John retorted, angrily slamming his own laptop shut. Sherlock growled out in frustration, then stopped in his pacing. Everything was deadly silent for a moment, before he turned to look at John.

"Where are they?" he then asked quietly.

"Where are what?" John feigned innocence.

"You know _what_. I need some."

"Sherlock..."

"Get me a case or get me cigarettes! Your. Choice," he gave John a stern look.

"What about the nicotine patches? Come on Sherlock... you can't give up _now!_"

"I ran out of patches."

"Then go and buy some more!"

"Like you'd trust me to do that – _you_ go buy them."

"Like I'd trust _you_ to stay here alone. Where the cigarettes are."

It seemed they had come to a stalemate, and neither would be going out to fetch any cigarettes at all. Thus, Sherlock dissolved back into his pacing and his incoherent mumbling about being too good for his own good and that he should maybe solve crimes at a slower pace, just so there would at least be _something_ left over.

So it went on for a few more minutes, those minutes slithering past as slowly as a snail on a hot day, until the detective caught sight of something – or more accurately, some_one_ – out on the street, hesitating ever so slightly outside of 221B. Immediately, Sherlock went over to the window to get a closer look.

"John, get the door. We have a client," he said, a half smile making its way onto his face. The blogger raised an eyebrow just a second before the doorbell rang. Sighing, the shorter man rose from his chair and made his way downstairs, bringing up a woman with bright blonde hair a few minutes later.

Sherlock had already set out a seat for the client and seated himself in his usual blue armchair. John gestured the woman to sit down in the wooden seat while he himself went to his usual red armchair. Silence filled the room, while Sherlock steepled his fingers under his chin and began to scrutinise the woman, who looked uneasy under his intense stare.

"Natural or fake?" he then suddenly said after some time. The woman jumped and so did John, who then shook his head a little.

"Are you talking about my hair?" she frowned slightly at Sherlock. "Because I can assure you it is most _definitely_ natural."

"Hmm. Oh – Sherlock Holmes, John Watson," Sherlock's lips twitched upwards for a fleeting second as he gestured at himself and at his friend. He fell silent for a moment as he still studied the woman, and then off he went. "Naturally bright blonde hair, second hand black suit, traces of rust under the finger nails and pen marks on your right hand as well as the expensive jewellery you own despite the fact your suit is second hand, I'd say you work in a high end jewellery shop," he came to that conclusion rather quickly. "Staff discount?" his eyes darted pointedly from her gold necklace to her matching earrings and bracelet.

The woman scowled at him.

"I can easily take my case somewhere else if you're going to be rude..."

"Ah – it's not him being rude, it's just his job," John tried to save his friend from the loss of a potentially good case.

"Fine."

"Name?" John had his pen and notepad out, ready to write down anything important.

"Jasmine Wilson," she said.

"Stick to the facts, make it short, but make it interesting," Sherlock relaxed back in his chair a little, shutting his eyes and waiting for Jasmine to start telling her story.

"Um, well... as you already know, I work in a jewellery store. Not exactly the best pay, but enough to get me by and occasionally let me treat myself," she started off. "Two months ago there was an advertisement for a club – sent in an email directly to me. Hang on, I have it here, printed out..." she opened up her bag and fetched out a folded piece of paper, handing it to John who opened it up and had a read of it:

_**The Sunny Club  
**__One more vacancy available at the request of Eleanor Hopkins; founder.  
__£370 a week.  
__All women of natural blonde hair and pristine mental and physical health.  
__Over twenty one.  
__Social club and desk jobs.  
__Please enquire at __**The W Hotel**__, Leicester Square; 24__th__ April 2011, midday to Daisy Ross._

"Obviously I went, and you should have seen the _amount_ of blondes there – if you were with a friend, you could have gotten lost in them! My colleague was a bit jealous, wishing she was blonde now, because of the pay – god, it would be enough to _make_ someone dye their hair, but then it's pretty obvious when someone does do that..." Jasmine trailed off for a moment before continuing. "So anyway, my friend and colleague – her name's Vicky – she asked me if I'd ever heard of the Sunny Club before, because she hadn't and naturally neither had I! She was just wondering if I had or not... But I went, and queued for quite some time before I was actually seen by this Daisy Ross and apparently I was very well-suited for the job.

"Of course she tried to see whether my hair was fake or not – she asked if she could just tug on it and she was close enough to know that I hadn't dyed it – I've _never_ dyed my hair, Mr Holmes – and after a few more questions from me about the sort of work I would be doing – organising databases on the computer – she told me I was hired right away! I was told to start on the next Monday at this block of offices in Soho. I still carried on work at the jewellery store of course – Vicky was only part time... but that made me part time for this Sunny Club..."

"What were your working hours?" Sherlock asked, his eyes still shut.

"From nine in the morning till one in the afternoon, and then seven in the evening until nine at night. It wasn't so bad, really, doing the job of sorting through computer files, gets togethers on the weekend with other people doing the same as me and then... two days ago, I went to go to the office and there was a sign on the door saying it had been shut down. That was it. End of. Everyone was just _gone_."

Silence.

"Is that it?" Sherlock's eyes snapped open, and he glanced at John who was note taking.

"Yes."

"Hmm..." he sat pondering for quite some time, and eventually a rare, proper smile came to his face. "You know, Miss Wilson, I believe I am intrigued. I'll take the case."

* * *

**This is only going to be a short fic, but I want to know what people think! I've been wanting to do a Red-Headed League AU for quite some time now, and I hope I can pull it off...**

**Thoughts?**

**-OL**


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